


fractured conversation

by youcouldmakealife



Series: no expectation of returns [2]
Category: Original Work
Genre: M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-12-09
Updated: 2013-12-09
Packaged: 2018-01-04 04:29:59
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,425
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1076551
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/youcouldmakealife/pseuds/youcouldmakealife
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>He doesn’t know how to navigate this; for the first time, when it comes to Stephen, he doesn’t know what to do.</p>
<p>He’ll start with the guest room. He’s got to start somewhere.</p>
            </blockquote>





	fractured conversation

**Author's Note:**

> [tumblr!](http://youcouldmakealife.tumblr.com/)
> 
>  
> 
>  
> 
> Warnings at the end.

It’s an optional practice, that day, but Gabe goes in, because it’s that or stay home, wait by the phone, fall just a little bit deeper into the mess of information the internet offers. Think about Stephen finding out, eventually, when they wean him off the drugs. Anouk telling him, or maybe her leaving it to the doctors, a clinical diagnosis instead of a heartbroken mother. Being selfishly grateful that he won’t have to be there to see it, and bitter because he can’t be.

Hockey’s easier, hockey’s always easier, and he doesn’t want to think about the fact that’s always been true for Stephen as well, he doesn’t want to think at all, so he goes in, though it’s pointless, in the end, because Coach takes one look at him and tells him to go home. No point wondering why; Gabe doesn’t know if the lack of sleep is obvious, if he looks as wrung dry as he feels, or if it’s just because Stephen’s injury is probably front page for the NHL, because no one could have seen Gabe in the media scrum after the game, paralyzed, and thought it wouldn’t affect him. 

Gabe won’t go home, but Coach won’t let him play either, and it’s pointless to argue. He ends up useless on the bench, watching the drills, while the guys either avoid him or look kind of pitying, all weirdly nice, which doesn’t really suit them, fits like a bad suit, the lot of them chirping each other before nudging Gabe’s shoulder, gentle, like he’ll burst into tears if they tap him too hard. Now he just wants desperately to go home, where all the misplaced sympathy would go away, because it isn’t him that’s done, he’s fine, he’ll play tomorrow, and Thursday, and Stephen will be lying in a hospital bed, where someone’s going to tell him his life’s over. He can’t go home, though, not until practice ends, because that would just make them even nicer, and he doesn’t think he could take that right now. The last thing he needs is kindness. 

*

Gabe spends a shitton time talking to Anouk or with his mom, his dad, Johan, who is still in Toronto with Stephen’s sisters and clearly frustrated, the way Gabe’s frustrated, to be relying on second-hand information. No time talking to Stephen, not really, not between the time zones and Gabe’s game schedule. Anouk’s gently informed him that Stephen hasn’t even really been talking to her, not since the doctors laid it out for him, but that isn’t the same, Gabe isn’t Stephen’s _mom_.

There’s another surgery, that he knows, then stabilization, Johan flying into Pittsburgh while Gabe’s parents take Anna and Elisabeth in so they don’t miss any school. Then they’re flying Stephen back to Toronto, which makes sense, to go home, to go back where there’s a support system, but he knows what it’ll look like to Stephen, he knows what it is; no player lives out an injury in their hometown unless it’s not worth staying. It’s the most hopeless sign there is.

Stephen texts a bit, once he’s home, short, more text-speaky than before. Gabe doesn’t even consider why until he’s got both thumbs flying over a response, and then he just feels sort of sick. Wonders if matching the text-speak looks better, or just like he’s mocking him. He’s already carefully trying to excise hockey from anything he says, and that’s fucking impossible--there’s no reason for him to be in Denver except because he’s playing the Avs. There’s no way to work around practices, around games, and every time he tries, Stephen sends him a text about his assist, or chirps the Canucks for blowing a three goal lead and losing in overtime, and that should make things okay, but all he feels is nauseous with guilt, because Stephen’s determinedly one hand texting in his old bedroom while Gabe’s out on the ice.

It’d be status quo, except Gabe can’t chirp back, because the Penguins’ losing streak doesn’t belong to Stephen any more than it does to Gabe. Can’t send his own congrats, can’t think of a response to the chirping that doesn’t feel strained. Sends more smileys than he thinks he has in his entire life. At least Stephen chirping him over them feels a little more natural.

There are calls, but they’re awkward, short, Stephen being weaned off Codeine and alternately hazy or grumpy and pained, Gabe talking about shit neither of them is interested in, because there isn’t really much to his life right now outside hockey and updates on Stephen, and every time he trips up and mentions a team prank or this place in Phoenix Stephen should try, he ends up backpedaling so hard he almost chokes on it. It’s still better than getting his updates from Anouk and Johan, feels less dishonest to actually talk to Stephen than to hear how he’s doing from his parents, but Stephen isn’t saying shit about anything of substance, will move right on if Gabe tentatively broaches it, and every conversation feels like skating over thin ice.

They still haven’t talked about the reason Stephen’s back home, and part of Gabe is selfishly glad he doesn’t have to, but the rest of him feels sick with it.

*

It’s three weeks after Stephen gets back to Toronto, and with the Canucks just starting a five game homestand when Stephen calls him, seven in the morning, wakes him up. He’s got his own ringtone, which is the only reason Gabe actually picks it up instead of letting it ring through, because this isn’t a civilised time to be awake.

Even so, he can’t help but pick up with a, “Seriously, Steve?”

“Don’t call me Steve,” Stephen responds, reflexive, then, “hey, is it cool if stay with you awhile?”

“Yeah,” Gabe says, scrambling up. “Yeah, shit, just let me get my laptop, I can book you--”

“Gabe,” Stephen interrupts, with the first thread of amusement in his voice that Gabe’s heard in, well, too long. “I’ve already got a ticket.”

“When are you coming in?” Gabe asks.

“In like an hour?” Stephen says. “Or, like, I’m leaving in an hour. Oh shit, one sec--can I have a medium double-double?”

Gabe pauses. “Are you at the airport?” 

He’s not sure if the silence is guilty or just Stephen busy fishing for a toonie.

“Tims,” Stephen sighs contentedly after a minute, and him being upbeat is pinging a little weirder now, more manic, like back whenever he went stir-crazy and suggested things that might lead to another concussion, sprain, broken bone, because inactivity makes him itchy.

“Your mom drive you to Pearson?” Gabe asks suspiciously. “My mom?”

“I took a cab,” Stephen says, and that is _definitely_ guilty sounding.

“Okay, should I wait for them to call me freaking out, or should I call them once you’re on the plane?” Gabe asks. He wishes this was the first time this situation had come up. Or maybe just that it was like other times, Stephen stealing his mom’s car keys to drive to Gabe in London, Stephen showing up in Vancouver after training camp instead of Toronto, trying to avoid going to a family reunion in New Brunswick. 

“Call them, I guess,” Stephen says, reluctantly.

“Cool,” Gabe says, dreading it. “Pick you up at the airport?”

“If you want,” Stephen says.

“Don’t be a moron,” Gabe says. “Text me your flight. And quit drinking that sugary shit.”

“Doesn’t really matter now,” Stephen says, and Gabe doesn’t know what to say. “Sorry,” Stephen says. “Forget it. I’ll text you.”

“If your mom starts crying I’m going to be pissed,” Gabe says, finally.

“Whatever,” Stephen says breezily, and hangs up on him, because he’s never learned manners, or, he has, but they pretty much disappear when he’s talking to Gabe.

Gabe rubs his face, sets his phone on silent so he has some plausible deniability if Anouk or his mom call before Stephen’s safely on the plane. Tries to remember if the guest room’s made up, or if he just left the sheets in a ball in the laundry room after the last time his parents came to visit. Wonders if getting some of the shit Stephen likes to eat but usually couldn’t would be seen as nice or just rubbing shit in. He doesn’t know how to navigate this; for the first time, when it comes to Stephen, he doesn’t know what to do.

He’ll start with the guest room. He’s got to start somewhere.

**Author's Note:**

>  **Warning:** Ongoing depiction of career-ending injury.


End file.
